Governors who have been, and other public men of Texas, Part 16

Author: Kittrell, Norman Goree, 1849-1927
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Houston, Texas, Dealy-Adey-Elgin company
Number of Pages: 320


USA > Texas > Governors who have been, and other public men of Texas > Part 16


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).


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The old man thought the joke so good that he had to tell it.


Such an incident would be impossible now, except at the peril of the penitentiary for the man who owned the building, and the man who kept the gambling house.


Some poker playing goes on, of course, but every effort is made to conceal it, and no man who notoriously gambled could be elected to the legislature.


As I now recall, Tom Ochiltree was Clerk or Assistant Clerk of the House, and wanted to practice law, but not having attained his majority, it was necessary to remove his disabilities of mi- nority. There was no statute for the purpose then, as there is now, and it took an Act of the Legislature to do what was neces- sary in the aspiring young man's case. The author of the bill moved that it be taken up out of its usual order, and be passed under suspension of the rules.


One of the members of the House was Hon. Thomas J. Jennings who was Attorney General of Texas at one time. He was a dig- nified, serious kind of a man, and rose and said: "Mr. Speaker, I understand the bill will operate to remove the disability of minority of Thomas P. Ochiltree, and thereby he will be able to receive a license as a lawyer-in other words, will by suspen- sion of the rules, be elevated to the dignity of a member of the bar. That being true, I shall cheerfully support the bill, because it provides for that which is both necessary and appropriate.


"I was for ten years a law partner of the young man's father and have known the young man almost from his birth, and I know of no young man more deserving of elevation by suspension than is he." The bill passed.


The son was far more famous than the father. I knew him well. Thomas Peck Ochiltree was a remarkable man. He left a reputation, or perhaps a better phrase would be, a notoriety, in one regard that was of course neither desirable or creditable, but now when it little recks him whether he be praised or blamed, it gives me pleasure to say that I believe that he was often


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charged with failing to conform his statements to the facts, when in reality he was telling the truth.


He was accustomed to speak with pride of his services in the Confederate Army, and many people believed all his statements were purely imaginative.


There is, however, no doubt that he did render efficient and courageous service, and that his commanding officer on whose staff he served, repeatedly in his reports bore witness to his gal- lantry. I have heard the reports read. If any average man in Texas had been told by Tom Ochiltree that he went to Europe in the diplomatic service of the government, and carried an auto- graph letter from President Grant, the statement would have been looked upon as an absolute fabrication, but it would not have been.


I personally saw and read the autograph letter wholly in Presi- dent Grant's handwriting, written on a White House letter head and signed with the familiar signature of President Grant. It was addressed to the diplomatic representatives of the govern- ment of Europe, and stated it would be presented by his friend, Major Thomas P. Ochiltree, who went abroad in a diplomatic capacity (as I remember, as Inspector of Consulates), and that he would be received and treated as befitted the dignity and im- - portance of his mission, or language to that effect.


In Europe, where there is such slavish adulation of rank and station, such a letter, of course, was, so to speak, an irresistible social instrument, wherewith to open the doors of every royal court to the bearer.


The fame and prestige of the writer both as a great soldier and as Chief Executive of the greatest republic in the world, justly entitled his friend to every honor customarily paid the bearer of such credentials.


After reading the letter, I said: "Major, what pay did you get for the services you rendered?" "Ten dollars a day and expen- ses," was his answer. I said: "It doesn't strike me that ten dol- lars a day is very much pay for the representative of the gov- ernment in such a capacity." His reply to, or comment on, my remarks was decidedly "Ochiltreeish," if I may coin a word. It was: But just think of the expenses!"


In the party on the occasion referred to was a gentleman who had been desperately wounded in the Confederate Army, and Major Ochiltree was very loyal in his feelings to all men of that class. The gentleman said: "Say, Tom, come on and let's have a glass of beer. (The scene of the meeting was a German Volks- fest). You refused to lunch with the Prince of Wales, but you won't refuse to take a drink with me." The Major said: "I knew the Prince of Wales wasn't inviting me on my own account, but only because I was in the American Minister's party at the yacht race.


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I had on an engagement to lunch with Captain Freemantle of the Coldstream Guards, who came over and stayed with our army during the war, and I knew I would have other invitations from him, but I never would from the Prince of Wales, and I was looking out for the future."


When the Major returned to the United States he stopped on his way to Texas, in New Orleans, and was invited to some very fashionable function, perhaps a Mardi Gras ball. The New Or- leans gentleman who accompanied him asked permission of the beautiful daughter of a rich sugar planter to present his friend, "Major Ochiltree, a close friend of President Grant." The young lady refused the desired permission, of which, of course, the Major had to be advised. His comment was: "What do you think of that? I, who have danced the minuet with every princess in Europe, am refused an introduction by a sugar biler's daughter."


He was appointed United States Marshal for the Eastern Dis- triet of Texas by President Grant, and when his term of office ended, the accounting officers of the Department of Justice said his accounts did not balance-marshals were then paid in fees.


Of course, most of the work was done and the books were kept by his deputies, and it is altogether likely the Major did not know anything about the accounts, but the Government insti- tuted suit against him and his bondsmen, but it was later dis- missed, or perhaps adjusted in some way.


While it was still on the docket, he ran for sheriff of Galveston county, and the matter was brought up on the stump. He pro- duced a letter from his two bondsmen to the effect, in substance, that they had no doubt that if the Major's claims of offset in the way of expenses was allowed, there would be no liability. It was explanation and exoneration in a very modified form, but when he had read the letter, he said: "Now, you see my bonds- men are not worried, and I haven't got any time to fool with the law suit. I am leaving it to my bondsmen to do the walking. I'm running for sheriff." He then continued, "I have proved to you that I did my full duty as a Confederate soldier, but they cuss me because I didn't stay here in the South in reconstruction times. I couldn't make a living here, and I had a chance to go to Europe, and I didn't see any reason why I should starve here when I could eat pate foie gras and drink champagne in Paris, and I went."


In 1882 he ran for Congress as a Republican in the Galveston District which then took in Laredo, and defeated Colonel George P. Finlay of Galveston and served one term in Congress.


He told me during the campaign : "Ain't I in hard luck? The Bishop of the Catholic Church on the Laredo section is my old school teacher, and I am a Catholic, and of course he won't do


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anything for me," and he winked his cocked eye, and indicated that he felt safe, and he proved to be.


I have heard that the late John W. Mackay, shortly before his death, put the Major in the way of making in some kind of stock speculation a very considerable sum of money, enough to keep him in comfort the rest of his days, and perhaps leave a small legacy to his worthy sisters.


It sounds like it may have been true. I knew one man in Texas who, I was told, "grub-staked" John W. Mackay when he was a miner in Nevada or California, and that many years later the Texas man was threatened with financial ruin unless he could get temporary relief, and he appealed to Mr. Mackey for help.


As quick as the wire reached him, and another wire could reach New York, Mr. Mackay placed a hundred thousand dollars to his friend's credit in that city.


Mr. Mackey was a very rich Irishman, and generosity and gratitude are characteristics of the Irish race.


I have often heard the story told that when "Major Tom" started out to practice law he put up his sign as follows: "Thomas P. Ochiltree & Father, Attorneys-at-Law," but I had grave doubts of the truth of the statement, and was inclined to the belief that it was one of those apocryphal stories which often become associated with the names of unique and interesting characters, such as Thomas Peck Ochiltree certaintly was, but since the preceding parts of this sketch were written, the story has been fully authenticated.


Very recently an esteemed friend in Houston who knew the Major as well as I did, told me he asked him about it. He told me that he said: "Tom, I understand that when you had ob- tained license to practice law, your father expressed to you the pride he felt at the examination you stood, and said he would take you into partnership, and that while he was gone on the circuit you might put up a sign for the firm, and that when he got back, you had a sign in gold letters a foot long, 'Thomas P. Ochiltree & Father, Attorneys-at-Law.'" The Major said: "There were no gold letters, but I did sure put up the sign reading that way."


The same friend told me also of the following incident as oc- curring within his knowledge, and I am sure there is no doubt of its truth substantially as 1 shall state it. After he had left the presidential office, General Grant visited Galveston, and elab- orate preparations were made to receive him in a befitting man- ner.


A committee of reception composed of the oldest and best known citizens was named to receive the eminent guest, then perhaps the most distinguished man in all the world. Major Tom had been appointed United States Marshal for the then Eastern


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District of Texas by President Grant, and any Southern man who accepted any position under a Republican administration in those days of "reconstruction" at once became persona non grata with every orthodox Southern Democrat. This feeling found expression in the rigid exclusion of Major Tom from every com- mittee, and from all participation in the reception and enter- tainment ceremonies, which action called forth no complaint at his hands, and he did not intrude himself upon the committee or the distinguished guest.


The only depot in Galveston at the time was an unsightly "shack" in the western part of the city, and the reception committee duly identified by proper badges lined up to receive General Grant, but Major Tom was not in the line. He stood afar off out beyond the end of the double column. When General Grant had nearly reached his carriage-there were no such things as autos in those days-his eyes lighted on the radiant red of the Major's hair and mustache, and he called out, "Why h-e-l-1-o Tom! How are you? I am glad to see you," and grasping the Major's hand continued, "Come right along and ride with me. I want to talk to you." Tlie Major in duty bound accepted the invitation, which was equivalent to a command, and so it was that the seat at the right hand of the great man, whom Kings had been proud to do honor to, was occupied by the Major instead of by the distinguished local citizen to whom the committee had assigned it. The stone which the committee had rejected the same became the head of the corner. He whom it was sought to humble was highly exalted.


When the Major was in Paris he was actor in a little drama which caused vast wonderment to the French. Many readers will remember that about fifty years ago the rage of the Parisian stage was the actress Adah Isaacs Menken, who won great fame by playing "Mazeppa," in which drama she rode, in as near a state of nudity as the most liberal limit of propriety would permit, a wild horse, to which she was strapped. The emotional and mercurial French patrons of the theatre went wild over the performance and sought every occasion to crown the beautiful woman with wreaths of roses and laurel. She was the "toast and talk of the town."


Major Tom was standing on the street in Paris one day in company with a friend, when the latter suddenly exclaimed,- "Yonder comes Adah Isaacs Menken in her carriage." The people were acclaiming her on every side, and when the Major turned and saw her he said, "I am glad to see her, I'll just go out and stop her carriage and get in and ride down the avenue." The French would have been no more astounded had it been Napoleon III or his Empress in the carriage, and the Major had made such a proposal, so the party he was talking with said, "Why you cannot do it, and dare not attempt it." The Major said, "I'll bet


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you 50 francs that I will not only get into the carriage with her, but that I will do so at her invitation."


The friend promptly took the bet, and the Major sauntered out into the street and met the carriage, and the beautiful woman. The admired and feted queen of the hour recognized him and said, "Say, Tom, come get in and ride with me. I'll be so glad to have you," and the Major promptly entered the carriage and took his seat by the side of the great actress. The skeptical friend not only lost 50 francs, but like thousands of others was over- whelmed with astonishment. The explanation of the result of seemingly so remarkable a venture is very simple. Adah Isaacs Menken was born in East Texas and resided there, and she and the Major had been schoolmates and friends from childhood, and were "Adah" and "Tom" to each other.


THOMAS J. JENNINGS.


The name of Thomas J. Jennings appears as that of the Attorney General of Texas in the reports from Vol. 9 to Vol. 17, both inclusive.


He was a resident of Nacogdoches County and served in the House with my father.


One of his sons, Thomas R. Jennings, retired from the practice of the law on account of almost total deafness, and as I recall, died in Harris County some years ago.


Another son, Hon. Hyde Jennings, was a member of the bar of Fort Worth at the time of his death. I never knew him, but always heard him spoken of in terms of respect both as a lawyer and a man


I have the impression that General Jennings was very stately and dignified in bearing,-possibly the term "pompous" might not inaccurately be applied to him. His manner was wholly natural -not affected.


It is said that he magnified his office to such an extent that when even an old friend would come in he would rise and in the most stately and formal manner ask, "Have you business with the Attorney General?" He must have so received Dr. Ashbel Smith in that way on one occasion, as I have heard my father say that he met Dr. Smith one day and the old fellow said, "Kettrill, Jennings is an atheist." My father said, "I have never heard so,- you must be mistaken." "No, Kettrill, I am not. He is an atheist, because he acknowledges no higher power than Thomas J. Jennings."


Notwithstanding his somewhat exaggerated official dignity, he was an able and upright man who proved equal to every demand, and rendered Texas valuable and honest service.


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HORACE CHILTON.


Horace Chilton is another product of East Texas who has done his section great credit. His father, Colonel George W. Chilton, was, as I recall him, a distinguished-looking man of the blond type, a gentleman of the old school. He was a gallant Confederate soldier, and was wounded in battle, and practiced law successfully after he had returned from the army. I believe he and my father served in the House together before the war.


As I have said before, service in the Legislature in those days was considered more of an honor than to go to Congress is now, and I seriously doubt whether any delegation Texas has had in Congress in the last quarter of a century was equal in intellect and legislative ability, taken as a whole, to the same number of men, who served in the Legislature of Texas between 1850 and 1860, and it is no dispargement to any Congressman to make this statement.


If my recollection as to genealogy is correct, Colonel George W. Chilton was a nephew of Hon. W. P. Chilton, who was for twelve years Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama. I know that his son, Horace Chilton, is called "Cousin" by the family of Hon. L. A. Abercrombie, late of Huntsville, whose wife was a daughter of Hon. W. P. Chilton, and a mnost cultured and accomplished lady.


When Hon. Horace Chilton was a candidate for the Senate, after his appointment by Governor Hogg to succeed Judge Reagan, I interested myself in his behalf. Though I had never been a supporter of Governor Hogg, who appointed him, I approved highly of the appointment. I took a double buggy and drove Senator Chilton over a part of Leon and Madison Counties, and to Huntsville, and he delivered several speeches on the trip, one at Madisonville.


I recall one incident on the trip very vividly. Madisonville was by no means then the well-built, attractive town it is now. The hotel was a kind of intermittent inn, sometimes open and some- times not, and when open by no means inviting either as to bed or board, so the "drummers" with their unerring instinct for good eating, and the ability to find where it could be had, had beaten a path to the private residence of a merchant in the town, and he had been almost perforce compelled to make his house a hotel.


I did not tell the Senator where we would stop, or what we would likely get to eat, but we went to the quasi-public house. The host was a Russian Jew of generous rotundity, and most genial and likable, and his wife was a most excellent woman and his daughters very attractive and exemplary young ladies, whom I had known almost from their infancy.


We went into dinner (not lunch) about 12:30 and found what I knew we would find, enough wholesome food for forty people,


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instead of for ten, which was about the number at the table. After we had eaten to repletion the Senator said, "Judge (I was then on the bench in that district), you may call that a dinner. I call it a banquet," which, considering the Senator was fresh from Washington where opportunity for rich feeding was present on every hand, I thought a high compliment to the village hostelry.


The wife of the host supervised the cooking and was herself one of the finest cooks I ever saw. There is not a hotel in Texas today, barring none, that ever served such meals as were served in that interior hamlet, nor can they serve a meal on finer damask, or on a table furnished with handsomer china, or cut glass.


Such entertainment greatly relieved the monotony of overland travel, and repeated speaking, and the quaint humor of the host who was a character as unique as he was amusing, was very entertaining. He said one day: "Gentlemen, walk in. Maybe you find something to eat, I don't know; but I bet you don't find no hog meat in this house. My wife is the out-beatenest Jew ever you see, and it's all that doggone Jacob business what you don't eat hog meat. When I go fishing I take my American Bible and eat bacon, but I don't get none here." I said, "Jake, Jacob is not to blame. It is the Mosaic law to eat nothing which splits the hoof and chews not the cud." "Oh," he said, "Moses and Jacob was partners, and it was all business mit Jacob. He took dose striped sticks and beat his fadder-in-law out of his cattles, and then he say, 'Don't you eat no hog meat. Eat all de time cattle meat. If he been in the hog business he would say, 'Don't you eat no cattles, but eat hogs.' It was all business mit Jacob, and I got to pay 35 cents for cow butter to cook mit and can't eat no hog meat." The exegesis of my Jew friend might not be accepted by theological exegetes as correct, but they cannot justly deny it the quality of originality.


Senator Chilton and I had a very interesting trip, which I have often recalled with pleasure.


His father died, I think, in 1884. I met the son at the Demo- cratic State Convention that year in Houston, and he told me he had lost his father. His sorrow was then fresh, and evidently he felt the blow deeply. I am impressed with the belief that the affection between father and son was unusually strong.


The father lived long enough to see the son achieve that high distinction as a lawyer which he has consistently maintained, and if he could have been spared to see his son in the position of Senator from his native State in the most august parliament in the world, his cup of joy would have been full to overflowing.


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ROBERT SCOTT LOVETT.


Another East Texas man who has won for himself a high position in the fields of both law and business is Robert Scott Lovett.


He was for a number of years a member of the firm of Baker, Botts, Parker & Lovett, but something like sixteen years ago he went to New York at the instance of the late Edward H. Harriman, who was one of the greatest railroad men in America, which is to say, in the world.


It is a rather remarkable fact, and one most complimentary to the firm of which Mr. Lovett was a member in Texas, that his former associate, Edwin B. Parker, has recently been called to New York in the position of General Attorney for the Texas Company. Mr. Parker rendered very valuable service to the. government during the war, and after the armistice was signed, was sent to France as a representative of the government in matters which involved hundreds of millions of dollars, and the proper management of which demanded both integrity, and a very high order of financial and executive ability, and Mr. Parker discharged his duties most efficiently.


Mr. Lovett is now practically the executive head of the entire Harriman system of railroads.


Mr. Harriman was not a wrecker, but a builder and developer, and he gave the public assurance that he desired and intended that the railroad system which he had built up should be honestly managed, when he committed it to the direction of Robert Scott Lovett.


He directs its operations with the same regard for, and observ- ance of the obligations of honesty and fair dealing which marks his action in all the relations of life.


He was born in the pincy woods about sixty miles north of Houston, in what was then Polk, but now San Jacinto County, about sixty years ago. His parents were most worthy people, but in modest financial circumstances, and he has risen to the position he now occupies by sheer force of personal merit, without the adventitious aid of any financial, political or social "pull."


I have known him for thirty years, and have known his cultured and accomplished wife since she was born. She is a native Texan, born in Huntsville.


If all the men who have been responsible for the management of the railroads of the United States during the past fifty years, and had been such men as Mr. Lovett, the prejudice against rail- roads and the antagonism between them and the people which has cost the roads many millions of dollars, would never have been developed.


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The fullest, frankest, and most instructive testimony given before the Congressional Committee which in the recent past investi- gated the question of railroad finances, and operation, and the reciprocal rights and duties of the government, the people, and the roads, was that of Mr. Lovett. It was published in pamphlet form, and is well worth reading by every man who wants to be correctly informed on a great public question.


Mr. Lovett is a director in the Western Union Telegraph Com- pany and in other large corporations, and so long as he holds those positions, the assurance will continue that no illegal or improper action will be "put over" with his knowledge, and most certainly not with his co-operation.


The place of Mr. Lovett in the firm was taken by Judge Garwood -a fact most complimentary to both gentlemen.


MORRIS SHEPPARD.


One East Texas, or rather Northeast Texas man, has achieved phenomenal success in politics. He comes from the Northeastern part of the State, but has always breathed the balsamic odor of the pines, which seems to have the magic power to transmute almost any average man into a successful politician.


Senator Sheppard's father was for many years a most capable district judge, and passed from that position to a seat in Congress.


He of course left the bench of the district court impoverished, as has every man who served at a salary of $2,500, and could accumulate no money in Congress,-hence I assume left his family but little heritage, except a stainless record and an honored name. Upon his death a number of able men offered for the place, but his son, Morris Sheppard, then as I recall less than thirty years old, swept the field.




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